06/20/2026
The Go Hawk Happy Tribe and the "Big Chief James Whitcomb Riley"
So this story is a new one for me, and as a Riley Historian, I love finding these little bits of Riley history...
James Whitcomb Riley was a national sensation by the turn of the century in 1900. He was invited to the White House to speak. He was writing poetry to commemorate significant National events as an unofficial "poet laureate." He was having his poems repackaged in books similar to a "greatest hits" collection which were sold in great numbers. He was touring to sell out crowds. Riley was truly "at the top of his game."
However, it seems that Riley always made time for the small stuff. Especially if what was asked, had to do with children. In reality, Riley was a big kid at heart and his most beloved poems were those that dealt with childhood. This earned him the moniker, "The Children's Poet."
In 1908, a Hoosier born children's author by the name of Emilie Blackmore Stapp wrote a book entitled, "The Trail of the Go Hawks." Stapp was a 32 year old literary editor for the "Des Moines Capitol," a newspaper out of Des Moines, IA.
The book details the misadventures of ten boys and two girls who form a club called "The Go Hawks Tribe." Initially, the tribe "plays Indian" and raids pantries, scalps dolls and engages in various mischief. However, the story pivots when the group sees a mission in collecting money for a local poor boy.
This story would launch a real benevolent movement that would ultimately have a world impact, and Riley would be directly involved in its launch.
According to Stapp's own records, the creation of a real, "Go Hawk Tribe" started with a letter from a young Go Hawk fan from New York. Jimmie was disabled and terminally ill. When Stapp visited the 10 year old, he told her his most ardent wish was to run around, "play Indian" and do good deeds like the Go Hawk tribe in her book. She suggested that she and Jimmie form their own tribe, a "Happy Tribe" because everyone wants to be happy. Those who belonged would earn arrows for doing good deeds that made others happy. All members would be identified with a membership button, and they would select a famous person to serve as "Big Chief."
At Jimmie's request, Stapp contacted James Whitcomb Riley to serve as America's Big Chief of the Go Hawk Happy Tribe. In her 1914 letter to James Whitcomb Riley, Stapp asked the poet to be the head of the Go-Hawks Happy Tribe saying; "It seems to be the desire of the children of Indiana that you should be designated Chief of their happy tribe. The Go-Hawks Happy Tribe is composed of good little Indians from 7 to 77 who are discovering that the only real happiness in life lies in service. All over the country children are showing fealty to the tribe by donning the button emblem of service. So here's your button which makes you a member for life. If you are caught without it some young Indian brave or squaw may rise up and scalp you."
In a letter dated February 1914, Riley accepted the honor and replied back, "I am happy to be the chief of both the little children and those with the spirit of little children, even though 'the golden hair be gray.'"
Stapp wrote back, asserting, "I am so glad you have not grown up. Neither have I. You must never tell my employer, nor any of those many publishers who overwhelm me with books for criticism, but I still believe in fairies."
Riley worked with Stapp to promote the tribe until his death in 1916. You can see that Riley composed an original poem that was attached to the membership card with the official membership pin.
The writing of the book and the creation of the club rewarded Stapp with her own "Happy Page" in The Des Moines Capitol newspaper, where she could share news of tribe members and their charitable deeds. The newspaper created a "Go Hawk" Department to help with promotion and ran a front page story about the Go Hawk Happy Tribe in May, 1914. Children were to send in two cents for postage for a Go Hawk membership button and instructions as to how to set up a Go Hawk Happy Tribe in their own community.
Members were sent a certificate that read, " i promise to do at least one act of kindness every day. I will do all in my power to protect birds and all wild animals." The Tribe's motto was "to make the world a happier place." When Go Hawk membership in any community reached a hundred, the reward was a large photo of "Big Chief" James Whitcomb Riley.
Both adults and children joined the tribe. Homemade outfits were created that had an Indian motif and soon membership grew to over 80,000 people. Stapp was recruiting members by printing names in the newspaper. Entire Sunday Schools and other groups were joining.
The Go Hawks even expanded overseas, and Riley's friend, Rudyard Kipling author of "The Jungle Book," was recruited to be the "Big Chief" in Great Britain.
The Go Hawks first public philanthropic mission came from a little boy named Jake who wandered into Stapp's office. Jake wore a faded blue shirt and was barefoot. He asked Stapp, "How much does it take to save a baby?" Stapp replied that it would cost six cents a day for milk, ice for refrigeration and nursing care. Jake gave Stapp six cents and asked her to find a baby who needed help.
Stapp located Mable, a sickly infant whose family didn't have a lot. Stapp promised to help provide for her needs and established a "Good Deeds Fund for Needy Children" and asked the Go Hawks to send in their pennies.
This endeavor soon expanded to other children.
In June 1917 with World War I raging in Europe, Stapp mobilized her Go Hawks Happy Tribe to raise 4,300,892 pennies or $43,008.92 to feed the widows and orphans of Europe. For her extraordinarily compassionate efforts to care of the orphans created by World War I, Emilie Blackmore Stapp was decorated by both the governments of France and Belgium for distinguished service.
In May, 1921, Stapp would leave Iowa for Boston to become the Children's Editor of the Houghton Mifflin Company. While in Boston, she would establish, "The World Neighbor Club" in 1923. The purpose of the club was to establish relationships with and befriend children of different countries and to create libraries throughout the world where children could learn the English language.
She would work in Boston until 1925 when ill health forced her to quit. Stapp and her sister. would then move to the small town of Wiggins Mississippi where they would establish, "The Friendship Farm" and build their home, known as "The Doll House." Their home was specifically built to house their collection of over 400 dolls.
Stapp would continue her philanthropic activities and her writing. In 1940, Stapp authored "Isabella, The Wise Goose," and convinced Charles E. "Chubb" Howe owner of Winslow Press to publish it. Revived from folklore, Isabella was a large white goose with a sun-bright yellow beak, able to lay golden eggs whenever she had a mind. The book received remarkable success.
However, soon Emilie Blackmore Stapp and her irrepressible goose, Isabella would be destined for much greater things than simple literary success.
During World War II, Emilie and her mythical goose, Isabella, were commissioned by the United States Government to sell war bonds. Isabella's Victory Flight was launched in 1942. Stapp sold Isabella's war bonds through a letter-writing campaign she conducted. Requests to purchase the war bonds were sent on stationery with a reproduction of Isabella. The letters listed Stapp's address as Isabella's Victory Flight Headquarters, The Dolls' House, Wiggins, Mississippi.
Emilie Stapp and Isabella took part in four Victory Bond drives. She ultimately raised nearly $3 million (approximately $42 million today) in war bonds through the use of her avian literary creation, Isabella the Goose.
Stapp would write several more books about the adventures of Isabella the Goose, and this would allow her to afford several scholarships for students in Wiggins as well as other philanthropic activities. Unfortunately in the early 1950s, Stapp's writing career would come to and end when she fell and broke her hip in an accident.
Adhering to her Christian Science faith, Stapp did not seek treatment for her hip. She was in constant pain and bedridden for the last seven years of her life, before dying in 1962, just a few days short of her 86th birthday.
Throughout her life, Emilie Blackmore Stapp exhibited the conduct of a Go Hawk "to do a good deed at least once a day" and she most certainly exhibited the motto of the Go Hawk Tribe: "To Make The World A Better Place."
Brigette Cook Jones
Riley Historian
Gray, Paige. "Happy and the Go-Hawks." Humanities, May/June 2014, Volume 35, Number 3 National Endowment for the Humanities Accessed June 2026. https://www.neh.gov/humanities/2014/mayjune/statement/happy-and-the-go-hawks
"Emilie Blackmore Stapp" Wkipedia. Accessed June 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emilie_Blackmore_Stapp
Noun, L. R., (1996) “Emilie Blackmore Stapp and her Go-Hawks Happy Tribe: A World War I Children's Crusade”, Iowa Heritage Illustrated archive 77(4), 172-190. doi: https://doi.org/10.17077/1088-5943.1256
Ruffin, Ellen. "Emilie Blackmore Stapp and The Trail of the Go Hawks 1908" The University of Southern Mississippi. Accessed June 2026. https://lib.usm.edu/spcol/exhibitions/item_of_the_month/iotm_may_2020.html
